The Trouble We're In

AUTHOR: Nyxie

Part 1

"Buffy?" She can hear her own incomprehensible disbelief reflected in the syllables of her name as they fall from his lips.

"Angel."

Regina—-if that's her name, and Buffy's strongly beginning to suspect that it's not—-glances at Buffy sharply as she speaks, then looks back at Angel, eyes unreadable.

"You two... know each other." It's not a question. But the way she says it... Buffy suddenly understands that Regina doesn't have the first clue who Buffy is.

"We're ah," Angel begins.

"Old friends," Buffy finishes, voice faint.

"Friends," Regina echoes, doubtful.

"Right," Buffy says. "And now that we've done the whole catching up thing, I REALLY need to go." She takes a deep breath and turns, hurrying through the double doors.

"Buffy!" Angel's voice, calling after her.

She does the only thing she can. She runs.

*

Petticoats, heavy in her hand like the weight of memory, suffocating her, and she doesn't understand; doesn't know why this bothers her so much. After all, she's moved on, so why shouldn't he?

--Two years—

Ever since she was a girl, all Buffy had ever wanted was to be normal. To have a family home with a white picket fence and a minivan, a couple of children, a dog, a cat. She could see that two story white home, with its dark red shutters and gauzy curtains and emerald green lawn so clearly in her mind that at times she could almost smell the grass, hear the sound of children playing, the errant, joyful bark of a dog. Could envision an infant cradled in her arms and larger, stronger arms wrapped lovingly around them both. She could picture that life so completely; mundane, and comforting, idyllic in its peace and simple living. She didn't know what she did there... maybe she worked at a bank, or sold real estate, or baked cookies, but it had never mattered. She just knew that she wanted it.

Later, she'd still wanted to be normal, still dreamed of that house and its charms, her face always softly lit, diffused with yellow light that painted her in shades of joy. And she’d met him, and she’d known then the face behind the arms that would hold her one day.

It should be me. Doesn't he know it should be me?

What the hell is wrong with you?

He can't. He's not supposed to LOVE her--

I can't breathe.

*

"Dammit!" Angel throws his mask through the air, not quite letting go of it, his face a riot of conflicted emotion.

Nina breathes. Slowly collects herself. No one has explained anything yet, but she can work it out for herself. She's a big girl, and she knows love when she sees it. She just... didn't expect it. Not from him. Not from Angel. He was... stoic. Emotionally challenged guy. The kind of guy that she's still trying to wrestle the admittance of the emotion from, two years later.

Angel twists and turns, like a paper cup caught in the wind.

"Who is she?"

Angel's eyes find hers, and she doesn’t like what she sees in them. Not at all.

"Buffy."

"That's a name. I asked who she IS."

"Dammit. Nina. Todd and Colleen are about to start the speech. Karthos will be—"

"Fine," she says, swirling her glass of champagne, eyes locked on the effervescent liquid. "Go."

"I have to." His voice, so dark, filled with burden.

"I know." She manages to meet his eyes, just barely, her smile like a ghost. "Go," she says again, leaning to kiss him gently.

He goes, leaving her to the poison of her own imagination.

*

It's nothing

Bullshit! It's something! Did you see how he looked at her?

That's paranoid. You're being silly.

Did he look silly when he looked at her?

She turns away from the internal voice that is hers but not quite hers at the same time, scans the crowd, moving slowly and deliberately, bright blue eyes roving restlessly.

There.

She moves along the edge of the room, glass in her hand like a talisman; the only thing that lets her move normally among this throng. It's the one thing she can cling to. Her sanity.

She just wants to see his face. They don't have to speak. She just needs to know. No big deal.

She moves past the man in her sights, glancing back to look at him, just once, full-on face—-

"Oh, my God."

Spike scowls out at her from inside his sheep costume.

*

"You," he says over a mug of beer, blue eyes cool as he looks her over, and she might have been a bug, a spot of lint on his jacket sleeve—-that is, if he’d been wearing a jacket, which he wasn't. He was, in fact, wearing the most ridiculous sheep costume she'd ever seen, which looked as if it had been glued together by a mad seamstress with too much time and too many cotton-balls.

"Good to see you, too, Spike," she says, sliding into the chair across from him.

He sighs and rolls his eyes, slumping moodily down in his seat as he resigns himself to her presence.

"Been a while," she goes on, sipping from her glass.

"Yeah," he scoffs with a rough laugh—-is that bitterness, she wonders? "Since before Angel decided to—-" He breaks off suddenly, sitting up and looking at her with intent surprise. "Is he here? With you?"

Yep. That was bitterness, all right. She considers a moment before she nods in reply.

"Bloody, buggering bastard," he snarls, rising from his seat faster than she can follow.

"He thought it would be safer," she says, knowing how weak the words sound. "If he stayed away from you all. That anyone left from Wolfram & Hart would come after him."

"Oh. He thought so, did he?" he chuckles, deep in his throat without humor, blue eyes cold as he regards her. "See he wasn't so worried about you being safe."

"It's different with us," she says after a moment. "You know that."

"Is it?" he asks with exaggerated interest, dark brows rising high on his face, and for just an instant, she thinks she sees something in his eyes. He's hurt, oh yes, but it's more than that. Almost as if—

"We were family," he says suddenly, voice passionate. And then he recedes a little, shrugging mildly. "And... enemies. Later." Then he gathers his anger again and leans forward toward her, pointing an accusing finger. "But I stood with him at the end. And he just--leaves! In a billow of heroic trench coat, trotting off into the night without so much as a—-"

"He did what he thought was best," she says quietly.

He stands there, saying nothing, then finally shakes his head, chuckling again with nothing like humor. "He always does."

"So," she says casually, sipping from her glass. "You're here with Buffy?"” Such a strange name, and the taste of it is even stranger on her tongue.

"You.." Shadows and light sweep across his face, an intense display of so many emotions in such a small span that she cannot follow their course. "Did she see him?" he asks, suddenly, and there's something in his voice that's small, and pale.

Everything she needs to know is right there; every fear, every worry, every image plucked from her imagination is written in the lines of his face like a distorted mirror.

And he must see the answer to his own question in hers, because suddenly he deflates, sits down in his chair and stares moodily at his mug. "How'd that go, then?"

"Who is she, Spike?"

His brows shoot up in surprise, and then he slowly rolls his tongue against the inside of his cheek, blue eyes darkening with knowing. "You don’t know who she is." It’s not a question.

"No. But I get the feeling maybe I should," she replies stiffly, feeling vulnerable beneath the dark lights that dance in his eyes.

"Oh, luv," he says, and it's bewitching, the way he can twist so many emotions into words all at once; relish, sarcasm, sorrow and irony. "Have I got a story for you."

*

Nina throws down her purse as they step into the plush confines of the sterile hotel room, the motion itself thick with the frustration and confusion undeniable in her face.

"Why didn't you ever tell me?"

"Would it have made you feel better?" he asks meeting her gaze evenly.

"Yes! Angel—people talk about their feelings, about their past. Of course, I'm referring to people, here," she shoots, her words sharp and filled with pain.

"Do they?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because... it helps. Because people want to know."

"So does it help?"

She twists toward him, infuriated. "Not now, no. But if you'd told me from the beginning—"

"Then you'd have been fine tonight," he concludes without conviction. "Buffy showing up wouldn't have bothered you at all."

"God! Angel, that's not the point!"

"What is the point, Nina?" he asks, tiredly. "I could have told you all about her, what she meant to me, but all it would have done was hurt you."

"You could have given me a chance." Her voice is guttural, thick with tears. And he knows--knows with sudden clarity that blooms, sharp and aching beneath his ribs--that she knows. That she'd seen the way they looked at each other. She had seen the question in Buffy's eyes and heard his heart betray his stoic face in reply.

"Nina..." he takes her in his arms, shuddering bone beneath fragile skin. Takes a deep breath and sighs as he smooths her silky hair. "It doesn't matter. Buffy's in my past."

She breathes hard against him, voice a whisper that will haunt him into his dreams tonight.

"Not anymore."

*

When the sun breaks the horizon, Buffy gives up the illusion of sleep at last.

She spends the day alone, traveling the expanse of sand white beaches beneath the blue, blue sky. It's a gorgeous day. The wind sifts though her hair, displacing errant strands, golden and gleaming against the brilliant white-gold sand background.

Cancun is unlike anywhere else she's ever been on earth, its majestic white sand beaches crowned by an ocean of deepest blue, a sapphire of fathomless depths. The sky so close she could almost touch it. There is a sense of peace here, of life moving just a little slower, a lullaby that sings her soul to sleep.

Angel could never walk beside her here.

She'd been so young when she’d fallen in love with him. A different person than she was now. The last time she'd seen him, she’d been about to engage in the biggest fight of her entire life, and she'd given him silly speeches about cookie dough and maybe's. She’s no closer now to knowing who she is than she was then, but one thing she does know—-he's supposed to be there when she figures it out. She'd never really considered that he might move on, that there'd be someone else.

She'd never really considered that she might lose him.

She walks the shoreline, feet skimming cool blue water, eyes fixed on the distant horizon. And despite the tourists that swarm around her, she feels utterly and completely alone.

When she gets back to the hotel, the sun is deep pink and swollen, dipping low in the sky.

Angel's waiting for her.

*

"Hey."

"Hi."

Oh yeah. This is the scintillating conversation she's missed so much over the years.

"Look, Angel..."

"Buffy, I..."

They look at each other for a moment, waiting, and then, in a way that would make her want to smile if it didn't hurt so damned bad, Angel looks at her in that way that says he's figured out that he's the one who’s supposed to speak first.

"Buffy, I'm sorry for the way this happened. And I know you probably don't even want to see me at all, but I couldn't just leave things... let you leave without... saying something."

Her smile is more of a grimace, and she ducks her face, nodding. "I know. We'll be leaving town in a couple of days, so we’ll just stay out of--"

"No," he says, abruptly, and then pauses, looking sheepish at his own interruption. "I meant... it shouldn't have to be like this." He clears his throat, tries to meet her eyes. "Between us, I mean."

"Just lucky, I guess." She shrugs.

"It doesn’t have to be. We can be... adults, right?"

She looks up at him with flat disbelief. "You're giving me a speech about being an adult?" She blinks. "Regina put you up to this, didn't she?"

"Her name's Nina." Angel gives a smile that's almost painful. "And she wants you to come to dinner with us."

"Oh." Buffy stares at him for a moment, letting that register. "Oh. Well, gee, you know, I'd love to but I've got this whole mission thing going on where I'm trying to find a Slayer and—"

"There's no Slayer."

"What?"

"No Slayer. Just me."

The Spanish Diva. The costume. His disappearance.

She stares, and he has the audacity to smirk.

"What? You hadn't figured that out yet?"

"I... was... working out a theory," she hedges, and it comes out sounding so lame she can hardly keep from rolling her eyes at herself. "A really... important theory. Big theory. Chock full of… theory-ness."

His smirk curves into a smile, and she can’t help but smile back. And it shouldn’t hurt to see him like this, to look at him, to smile at him like this. But the pain in her chest is almost more than she can bear.

"So we'll see you at dinner, then? Tonight?" He's so sweet, and earnest, and hopeful and sincere and awkward, oh God, awkward, but it's endearing. Just like it always used to be.

"Sure. Dinner sounds..." --like the last thing I ever want to do on a very long and thorough list of things I never want to do—-

"Great."

*

After he's gone, the façade crumbles and the feeling rises up inside her like the churning of winter winds, glittering ice storm, shards thrown and falling, sticking to her ribs, her stomach, her heart.

He wasn't supposed to be this calm. Not while she was still so confused. And he definitely wasn't supposed to be this happy. Not without her.

Dinner. He'd asked her dinner. With his girlfriend. He didn't love her. He didn't want her. He hadn't even come to see her, he'd just come to try and make some kind of peace, to gloss this over, to smooth it out so that he wouldn't have to feel guilty anymore.

She is lost, angry and hurting, but he isn't. He isn't. And he can't... can't know this. Can't see her like this, empty and aching and alone, and he isn't.

She takes a deep, shuddering breath, air filling her, more emptiness to fill the empty places inside her like a balloon; skin as tight and twice as bloated. Stares in the mirror at herself, touching the black, wet rings beneath her eyes that make her look hollow and haunted.

She reaches for a tissue to blot away their damning stain.

She can't be stained when she sees him. She has to be brilliant smiles to bedazzle and tease his heart with longing that he should be the one to bring them to her lips. Coy eyes, perfectly shaded in hues of cerulean and sea foam that catch his and hold, bright and glittering depths that tell all the lies he wants to see and none of the truths that would kill them both.

She stands in the stark light of the bathroom and paints her face with painstaking care until she can't see the breaking girl beneath the mask.

*

Dinner is everything she'd hoped it wouldn't be, and everything she'd known it would. She doesn't even know why she came, except that some part of her had wanted to see him again, had wanted to...

What? See him with someone else? Make it undeniable and real and final so she could finally let go at last?

Had she actually bought into that bit about her and Angel being adults?

They make small talk, Nina poised and gorgeous and graceful, her face warm with smiles that don't quite reach her eyes, until at last Buffy can't stand it anymore.

"Excuse me," she says, quietly rising. She doesn't look back, but she can see them in her mind’s eye, picture the table with their elegant dinners spread out before them, in their beautiful clothes, their eyes not surprised, watching her with sadness and knowing.

She steps out the door and onto the beach.

*

She hardly makes it a dozen yards before she hears Angel behind her, and turns.

"Buffy."

His eyes are the center of the universe, they're everything, and she's going under, drowning in him, just the way she always used to do.

"Help me out with something here," she says, and she’s surprised how steady her voice is—how arch and angry. "Nina; Regina. That, I get. But..." She looks at him for a long moment, searching for the words.

"Rico?" she asks, incredulous.

To his credit, Angel looks chagrined. "After... After Wolfram & Hart, I had to go undercover. That's why I came to Mexico." The admission is taut, uncomfortable, reluctantly given, like so much between them.

"I needed an alias," he objects fervently, seeing her face.

"But... Rico?"

Finally, he looks down at the ground, sulky and petulant. "It's a Barry Manilow reference," he mumbles.

"Copa Cabana?!" Disgust mixes with distress and a myriad of other emotions, and she feels on the verge of breaking down. "And God," she exclaims, pushing her hands through the air, "I can’t even believe I know that song." She fixes him with a look. "You couldn't come up with anything better than that?!"

"Buffy. I'm so sorry. I never meant for you—"

"Do you love her?" she asks, and she can’t keep the desperate note from her voice, no matter that she tries.

He answers her with a surprising reluctance, voice catching in his throat.

"Not like I loved you."

Loved. The word hits her like a blow, discordant syllables that reverberate and echo, crashing down the halls of her mind to shatter against her heart.

His face softens, and he takes a step closer to her, and she can feel him, the electric energy arcing between them, a tangible tantalization just out of her reach. She can feel the breath he draws from the air, its absence from her own lungs, feel the currents of the movement of his body. She breathes deep, closes her eyes—

Close your eyes

--as if that alone might save her. From somewhere far off down the beach, a world away, comes the sound of brass band music, faint and faraway, like a distant dream.

"Love," he says, voice a warm breath against her mouth. Sparks of electricity shoot through her as the air shaped by his mouth moves over her skin. Goose bumps spill down her spine, heat rushes between her thighs, and she is taut as a bowstring, straining on the edge of breaking.

Fingers ghost over the line of her cheekbone, trailing fire and leaving fingerprints across her soul as indelible as time. She opens her eyes, and his face is a plea, an apology and an entreaty all at once, and she knows he is sorry in the instant before his mouth meets hers, knows, too, that he wants it just as much as she does.

*

When he kisses her, he thinks of yellow; delicate daffodils painted with light, peppers ripe and full, drenched with the taste of the sun. Waves pound against the shore in time with her heartbeat, the sound of their smooth crashing filling his ears, his mind, his heart, until all he can feel and taste and see and smell is her.

It's wrong. He shouldn't be here like this with her, not when Nina's still sitting in the restaurant, her blue eyes sad and knowing. He knows it's wrong. But it doesn't feel wrong. It feels right as rain, right as raw cookie dough in mint ice cream and the light scent of jasmine on the night air. He knows he should stop, pull away and turn his head, walk off down the beach like he’s walked away from her so many times, leave her heart sad and breaking against the uncaring sand, regret wedged in the soft places between his ribs. He knows all these things, and yet he can’t bring himself to stop, his heart singing a melody remembered, inexorable and irresistible.

Angel Investigations, Wolfram & Hart, they have been his attempts at making a contribution to the world, his own special brand of justice, of making the world a right and better place. But they are nothing so much as a legacy begun by her that he has carried on like a prayer against the private war inside his heart; a lantern to bear against the darkness that lurks bone deep and whispers, beckoning. All his time spent in good deeds carried on in the name of salvation for the world and himself both—they have always been simple constructs, comforting cages to house his love and guilt, built with carefully constructed precision in her name, sanctuary and solitude all at once.

And God help him, for the first time since he walked away from her six years ago, he feels free.

"Angel?"

His blood freezes, turning to ice, and his mouth stills, songs and dreams turned to dust.

Buffy pulls away, face pale in the moonlight, eyes tortured and bright with tears, fingers touching her mouth, still warm and wet with his kiss.

"Oh, God," she moans, and then she is gone, feet racing across tightly packed sand, leaving behind slight footprints that the sea slides in to reclaim.

Gone, as if she had never been there at all, save the taste of daffodils and sunshine on his tongue.

"Angel?" The tall grasses rustle; a dry, sharp hiss as Nina passes from the sparse stand of trees. "I thought I heard—-"

"I kissed her." He doesn't turn, and she stills, the whisper of her bare feet against sand ceasing. He can hear her gasp, a sharp intake of breath above the endless rhythm of waves.

He closes his eyes for a moment, gathers his courage, and finds there is only one thing to say. And even that can’t make this right. He turns, apology on his lips—

One pale arm arcs against the moonlight, palm open and stinging as it meets the skin of his cheek.

"Nina—-"

"Shut up! You don't get to say you're sorry."

He opens his mouth to speak, and she silences him with a look, her cheeks flushed with color against the trembling pale beauty of her face. For a long time, she just stares at him, blue eyes cool and even as she searches his for a response, and then, in a swirl of white silk, she steps up to him, hands on his stomach, her cheek sliding against his, breath hot and heavy, the warmth of her lips gliding over his skin. He stays still, waiting for her to speak, but she says nothing, nuzzling against him, mouth finding his with sweet, hot kisses. She tastes like lush hills and dark forests, spiced musk and moonlight as she pulls his coat from his shoulders, fingers gripping his arms, bruising as she pulls him hard against her.

"Nina," he pulls away, trying to see her, needing to look at her.

"What did she taste like?" Her eyes are twin fires in the darkness, filled with the luminescence of the moon.

He looks away, and her hands dig in harder, muscle grinding painfully against bone. He winces and stares at her, and her expression is still intent, fierce and fixed as she stares back at him.

"When you kissed her," she hisses. "What did she taste like?"

"I'm not doing this."

"Like hell you're not. You kissed her, Angel." A long draw of heavy breath. "What did she taste like?"

"No."

"Tell me!" Her voice is raw, filled with suffering and need and obligation. You owe me this her eyes implore. She is near naked and shivering in the thin silk of her dress, a little girl afraid and alone, so fragile and aching beneath the impending darkness of the sky.

"Truth, Angel. Tell me the truth."

He supposes he owes her that much, yes.

"Like sunshine," he whispers.

"Good. That's good." A harsh nod, and he doesn't mistake it for approval, only bitter appreciation of his honesty. She pulls him close again and her lips glide over his, soft and warm, scarcely touching him, breathing hot into his mouth.

"What do I taste like?" she asks, syllables flush with heat as her tongue flickers across his lips, into his mouth.

He shudders against her, trying to hold on to his mind. "Moonlight," he answers truthfully, ragged and low. "Wilderness."

She grabs him by the collar of his shirt, eyes flashing open. In them, he can see ancient trees, green and towering among a tangle of vines, sense the secret places of thickets and windfalls.

"But it's sunlight you long for, isn't it?"

"All vampires long for—-"

"Isn't it?" she growls, shaking him.

"Yes." He closes his eyes, the word falling from his lips like a betrayal.

"Good. Very good," she rewards him roughly, running her hands up into his hair, turning her face into his throat, tongue tracing slow circles against thin skin.

"Nina. I'm sor—-"

"Shh," she soothes, pressing a warm finger against his mouth, stilling the words. Her tongue traces down the edge of his ear with agonizing slowness. "I bet you were so sweet and gentle when you fucked her, weren't you?" she asks, one hand sliding down his body, finding him hard and trembling. "Reverent, even. Worshipped her like a goddess, like her virginity was a perfect pearl to be plucked." Her tongue swirls into his ear as she whispers, and it's the sensation as much as her words that send a thrill through his every nerve, guilty, sickening and excited all at once.

"But that's not how you wanted to fuck her, was it?" Her breath is a tattoo against his flesh, fluttering inside his mind with sensual, gossamer strokes that paint him with need. She traces the inner curve of his ear, flicking her tongue against it, her hand grasping the width of his cock through his pants and squeezing. He gasps and stiffens, arching his body into her, and he can feel her mouth curl in a smile against him.

"No," she whispers knowingly. "I know you, Angel," she said, her voice the only sound in existence. Zipper slowly sliding, warm night air and fingers against bare skin, caressing and squeezing with relentless rhythm. "You wanted to take her like an animal, make her cry and beg for you. You wanted to fuck her raw, mark her, make her come so hard that she'd be yours forever."

His cock twitches in her hand and he moans, deep in the back of his throat. Nina pulls back to look at him, the smile on her face knowing and satisfied.

"Fuck me, Angel," Nina whispers, nipping and catching his lower lip between unrelenting teeth, breath almost pained with feverish hunger as it fills him. She draws away, taking his lip with her for a moment before releasing, and he can taste blood in his mouth, coppery and sweet.

"Fuck me like you want to fuck her." Her eyes so consumed with need that they border on madness beneath the moon. "Show me what it feels like to be sunshine."

God, he can smell her, dripping wet between her thighs, and something inside him breaks open, rusted hinges screaming as he throws her to the sand and falls on top of her, kissing her, body arching into her as he rips her dress up over her hips. Reaches down between her legs and moans when he finds wetness there, satin clinging to hot flesh. He hooks a finger beneath the damp satin, brushing over her clit, then pulls her panties aside, burying himself inside her with a single thrust of his hips.

Her fingernails rake trails of fire up the length of his back, pulling his shirt up as they tear at him, and he hisses in pain that is nearly pleasure, hips jerking back and slamming inside her again.

*

And through it all, Buffy watches from behind a narrow copse of trees, her heart pounding and breaking against her breast, wetness slick between her thighs, her mind a dull roar of white noise.

He had kissed her. She could still feel the warmth where his mouth had been. He had kissed her, and now...

She watches until they both cry out, loudly enough to reach her ears, and then the spell that held her there, motionless, finally breaks at last, and she runs as fast as her feet will carry her back to her hotel room.

*

"What was it like when you were together?"

"Nina..."

"No. Tell me." Soft as silk, strong as steel, clamping like iron bands around his heart. You owe me this much.

He sighs and looks away, somewhere off into the middle distance where memories dance and twist like half remembered dreams.

"When I..." He snaps his teeth together, grits his jaw, wrestling between kindness and truth. He looks to her again, desperate and silently pleading. He loves her, this sweet, powerful blonde woman with mischievous eyes and a gentle heart. Doesn't she know that? Isn't it enough?

Don't make me.

You owe me this much.

"I had nothing to live for," he begins, simply. "And she... she was this beautiful girl..." He breaks off, shakes his head, envisioning her in his mind; soft blond hair and glowing smiles, sad eyes and fading hope. "So strong, so fragile. Burden of the world on her shoulders, and yet she smiled, she laughed, she... Loved me." Eyes soft with memory, but oh, so bitter. "I had nothing to live for, and she was everything... everything I wished I could be. I did so many horrible things, Nina. I could never count the cost, could never believe in forgiveness..."

"Until you met her," Nina finishes, swallowing hard against the words.

"It wasn’t fair," he grates, letting her statement stand without reply. "I hung all my hopes and dreams on her. I made her into the altar of my salvation and worshipped at her feet."

"Did she save you?"

He presses his lips into a thin, white line, everything inside him pricking and sharp, the jagged angle of his heart cutting against his chest. The sound of Angelus's laughter echoes in his mind, flapping around him like bat wings.

"I broke her."

"Did she forgive you?"

A bitter, hollow laugh escapes him and he rubs a hand across his jaw, shaking his head. "Of course she did," he says with sour irony. Then, again, more quietly, with finality, "Of course she did."

Nina lies next to him on the sand, silent and unmoving save the rise and fall of her chest. Waves roll and crash against the shore ceaselessly and he can hear eternity in the sound, restless and unending.

"There's nothing I can say that can turn her from an ideal back into a real girl again, is there?" she asks, voice soft.

He takes her hand in his, squeezing her fingers tight, trying to stop the aching of his own heart with the pressure.

"You still love her." Courage, tattered and peeling, clinging to her by threads stretched thin and fine as spider webs.

He doesn't answer.

*

Buffy lies awake in the hard, hotel bed, eyes open wide and unseeing as they stare into darkness. From somewhere far off, the clock ticks off slow seconds that creep into minutes, and she can hardly hear them above the beating of her heart.

In her mind's eye, they are vicious and virile beneath the moon, two wild animals that tear and claw at each other in passionate frenzy. The muscles in his back ripple with Herculean effort as he thrusts desperately inside her—-

Me. It should have been me—-

No, don't think about that—-

--and she can feel him, rock hard and unyielding, stretching her, filling her, thrusting and pulling so hard that her body rocks with uncontrolled rhythm, hands digging into her shoulders, holding her in place as he fucks her relentlessly, unrestrained need and passion laid bare upon his face for her, all for her—-

Her fingers slip down inside her jeans, between her thighs, body pulsing and straining until she explodes with a strangled cry.

Sleep takes a much longer time to arrive.

Go to Part III

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